ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. – Maverick McNealy guessed that in his mind he had made a putt to win a PGA Tour over a thousand times. On Sunday, the 29-year-old stuffed a 6-iron from 183 yards on the par-4 18th hole at Sea Island’s Seaside Course to set up a 5-foot, 5-inch putt for his first victory at the 2024 RSM Classic.
“It felt like déjà vu and it came off perfectly,” he said.
His younger brother, Scout, screamed in jubilation after the winning putt dropped: “We’re going to Maui, baby!”
That would be the site of the 2025 Sentry, the first tournament of the new season in January that is a reward for winners. Maverick replied, “Yeah, we’re going to Augusta, too.”
Indeed, McNealy’s maiden victory comes with an invitation the Masters in April, too. McNealy had numerous birdie opportunities down the stretch during the final round, but he made the one that counted the most.
RSM: Leaderboard | Photos
The birdie propelled McNealy to a final-round 2-under 68 and a 72-hole aggregate of 16-under 266, topping Daniel Berger, Nico Echavarria and amateur Luke Clanton by a shot. Berger was in the final group with McNealy and missed a 21-foot birdie attempt, but he moved inside the FedEx Cup top 125 with his runner-up finish at the RSM. (Joel Dahmen closed with a bogey-free 64 to finish No. 124 and Sam Ryder, who missed the 36-hole cut, hung on to No. 125 and the final fully-exempt card for 2025.)
Both Echavarria and Clanton missed par putts on the final hole to drop to 15 under, waiting to see what the final two groups did down the stretch.
McNealy was the first to reach 16 under in the final round but he made a bogey at 14 and his trusty putter started to let him down. “I was definitely leaking oil, that’s for sure,” he said.
He credited his brother, who began caddying for him in August, with breaking the tension on the 17th green, making a joke that had him doubled over in laughter.
“Busting a gut, I didn’t think that was possible in that situation,” McNealy said.
Asked to share the joke, McNealy thought better of it.
“There’s two kinds of jokes,” he said, “there’s jokes that you can share and there’s funny ones, so I’m sorry.”
Added Scout: “I just try to keep him smiling and laughing, and when he’s playing like he is, it’s easy.”
Tied for the lead at the 18th hole, which played as the statistically most difficult hole of the day, he said he told himself, “Let’s hit two great golf shots and I can have the best off-season of my life.”
After a perfect drive, McNealy weighed his options, choosing a 6-iron, and listened to his brother’s advice. “He told me compress it, just smash down, take a divot. Scout’s coaching has been pretty simple lately, he says swing left and take a divot. So I just swung left, took a divot, all came out right online dead center of the clubface and it couldn’t have been a better time for it.”
Growing up, McNealy’s sport was ice hockey and he was a little-known recruit to just about everyone but Stanford’s golf coach Conrad Ray, behind top-ranked junior Jim Liu and Australia’s No. 1 player Viraat Badwhar.
McNealy always joked that Stanford had recruited No. 1 in America. No. 1 in Australia. No. 1 in Portola Valley (Calif). But he blossomed into the Haskins Award winners as the top male collegian, winning 12 times, and was the No. 1-ranked amateur when he turned pro out of Stanford. He made steady progress from the Korn Ferry Tour to the PGA Tour but couldn’t get over the hump for a win.
“I knew all the pieces were there, they just hadn’t fit together,” he said, noting that he was waiting to wait 10-15 years to taste victory if that’s what it took.
McNealy was sidelined for nearly five months last year after tearing the anterior sterno-clavicular ligament in his left shoulder during the 2022 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro Am.
“I never lost faith that I would be back better than ever,” he said.
He changed his golf swing mechanics to make sure he doesn’t put as much stress on the joint in his shoulder. This season, he satisfied his major medical exemption at the Farmers Insurance Open in Feburary.
McNealy admitted that the RSM Classic hasn’t been a good fit for his game in the past but his wife, Maya, convinced him to play this week because she enjoys staying at The Lodge, the hotel at the Sea Island Resort.
“I think she loves that cookie and milk service at 7:00 p.m. She’s like, ‘We’re playing Sea Island.’ I’m like, ‘OK, we’re playing Sea Island,’ ” he said.
McNealy opened with an 8-under 62 at the Seaside Course to take the lead, calling his play an A+ on Thursday.
“It was as good as it has ever been,” McNealy said. “it kind of affirmed all the work that our team’s been putting in and the changes we made this year.”
Then the task at hand became more difficult and he hung on through the worst of the windy weather on Friday to shoot 2-under 70 at the Plantation Course. A 66 on Saturday gave him a share of the 54-hole lead.
Clanton, a junior at Florida State University, nearly became the second amateur to win on the Tour this season. The T-2 gives him another point in the PGA Tour University Accelerated program, moving him to 17. That’s three points from earning a PGA Tour card.
“It’s going to be a tough one to definitely take, for sure, after bogeying the last, but I think it’s proven to me that out here I can win, so I’ll be training for that,” he said.
Instead, it was McNealy, who finally proved he had what it takes to win on the PGA Tour.
“The cool thing about professional golf is that you have the chance to change your life any given week and it doesn’t matter what happens the week before, two weeks before,” McNealy said. “Rafa Campos (last week’s winner in Bermuda) is an amazing example of that. It takes all year to have a bad year and it takes one week to have a great year.”
